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Saturday, June 21, 2014

Litha Blog Hop: Joy and Shadows

It's somehow ironic that, being the wrangler for this particular hop (which entails choosing the theme), I would experience writer's block, but that's just what happened between Beltane and Litha. I knew I wanted the focus to be "joy" because we spend so much time focused on what we can improve, or what needs tweaking, and not nearly enough time really basking in the glory of the joy that threads through our lives (at least that's how it often seems!). I'm a joy-person (not THE Joy Person - that's Arwen Lynch Poe!) and this is Litha, The Sun Celebration, so it all seemed very fitting!

New Orleans Voodoo Tarot
The divine light and joy within us!

So writer's block had me down, and then I found myself at the public library one evening with the three Joys of my life - my children! As the little ones were climbing and arguing their way through the aisles with me, I happened across the Tarot for Life book by Paul Quinn, which I'd never seen before - neither at the library nor any other place that sells or rents books - (and after looking at its positive reviews on Amazon I realize I'm a late-comer to that game, and that it's completely crazy that I'm so in-the-dark) so I snatched it off the shelf. After settling the kids in the children's section with books and blocks and crayons, I myself settled down to give the book a cursory sifting. It took about 1.3 seconds for me to realize I'd found a wonderful source of Tarot wisdom, and one of the aspects of the book that most attracted me was that it covered the "shadow" aspect of cards in addition to the upright and reversed meanings. It's actually brilliant, and it resonated with my own reading experience quite potently. I've written before about cards in readings, where their upright orientation belies their true essence, and though I hadn't given it a title before, "shadow" aspects were indeed what I was encountering.

Llewellyn Publications

I happened to flip to the entry for the Sun card, and suddenly bells began to go off in my head - the shadow of the Sun! This was something I'd pondered for probably close to a year, after having calculated my Tarot birth card. I'd found that my personality card was the Wheel, my soul card was the Magician, and my Shadow card was nothing other than…the Sun! The first two made complete sense to me, but the Sun as my Shadow? I read and read and researched and thought and analyzed and considered, and nothing seemed to click in terms of what the Sun as my Shadow really meant for me.

Did it mean that joy or success were difficult for me to achieve, or that I'd spend my life always working on improving those things? Not really…..

Was it that my natural happiness wasn't accepted by my community (per Jung) leading me to try to diminish my own capacity for joy? No….

As I was flipping the pages of Tarot for Life things started to fall into place, like pieces of a puzzle. I've always been drawn to happiness like a moth to a flame, in order (perhaps) to create an environment that reflected my inner world. As a result I stayed as far from sadness as I could manage. This wasn't a conscious decision, but a visceral reaction.

I remember that I never liked melancholy music. One important memory I have from childhood is that my older sister would request that my mom sing her the song "Clementine" before she would go to bed. I hated it. I would plug my ears and bury my head in the pillow in order to avoid hearing it. I thought it was such a sad song (a miner lost his daughter when she fell into the sea and drowned!!), and I hated feeling sad. As I grew up that never really changed. I always preferred happy, vibrant music (for the most part - incidentally I've always been a big Blues fan!), I avoided any movies that highlighted pain and suffering (for the most part! - I did actually choose to watch Schindler's List because the Holocaust is something we should never forget). Sorrow was an extremely difficult emotion for me to process.

Don't get me wrong, I don't - and didn't - see the world through rose-colored glasses, nor did I shy away from difficult truths, or the bittersweetness that sometimes comes from living. Looking back it occurs to me that much of that connects with being empathic, and not knowing how not to absorb others' emotions as my own. It makes sense then that I would have cringed at hearing Clementine - I was brought into the story, and felt the miner's pain, and the terrible sorrow of death (as funny as that may sound, as it's a children's song!). I've always felt a brilliant, joyful light shining from within me, and I wanted to just glow all the time, the full expression of my soul. And since life isn't happiness and light all of the time, my Shadow has truly been learning to face the pain and darkness that shows up from time to time along the way, and coming to understand through experience that while I still prefer being surrounded in positivity (who doesn't?), those painful times in fact provide valuable opportunities to grow, to understand myself (and others) better, and to become, ultimately, a more balanced human being. Additionally, as an empath a vital lesson is also to learn how to be supportive of others while learning how not to internalize their pain.

Ochun - Joy and Love
Image by Black Oshun Eternal

So what better time for this light of understanding to hit me than three days prior to the Litha Blog Hop, a time of Sun and Joy, a day of celebrating our fires before the gradual descent into the elongating shadows of Autumn….

To conclude, I want to bring this post back to the simple topic, so I will include a list of what brings me great joy:

19 comments:

Hi Olivia what a wonderful joyous post. We have so much to grateful for. The shadow side of the Sun... perhaps feeling sad is also made difficult by society because we are being held accountable for our happiness So who will choose sadness??? It has been very difficult for me to accept my "negative feelings" It felt like failure. Now emotional life has become more diverse and when I am happy I am truly happyI wish you and yours a wonderful Summer Soltsice

I think there's this acceptance of the pains of life in the Blues. And not a resigned acceptance, but almost a making fun of our little human traumas and dramas acceptance. I always see a wink and a nod in that music.

That's a lovely Lenormand card that you've used and The Sun is one of my favourite images from the Gaian Tarot because it's well, just so JOYFUL! Lovely post (and a round of applause for getting over the writer's block!)

Wonderful story, Olivia! The shadow of the Sun is a very deep and interesting concept all by itself. I have put Paul Quinn's book on my Amazon wish list (while I spend money on paint, plaster, cabinet hardware and other assorted remodeling-prior-to-selling-house things). I have been of two minds on the Gaian Tarot as a whole, but that Sun cards is great stuff!

Cool! Good luck with getting your house ready to go! I actually agree with you about the Gaian....There are several cards I really like and appreciate, but several others that don't really resonate. But yes, the Sun lady is truly joyous!

What an interesting insight into the shadow of the Sun! When I was young, I couldn't understand how people could do sad jobs (my mum was a therapist), or choose to stare at painful things (the reason why, despite being a yoga practitioner and teacher for decades, I wasn't all that keen on going to India). As you say, part of it is to do with being empathic, and once I learned to ground and centre, to create healthier boundaries, those things became tolerable (and I trained as a therapist myself!) My mind is now spinning with metaphors: clouds across the sun, eclipses, and yet the sun continues to shine, reflected in the moon at night... :)

Thanks, Chloe! It does seem ironic how many of the empaths end up becoming counselors and therapists of one sort or another. It really becomes critical to learn how to protect oneself so that we can help others without letting the feelings of others impact us too severely. Thanks for your comment!